Dear readers,
We want to use the December newsletter to spread good cheer - not only with our short Christmas video, including a little teaser for 2025!
Yes, the geopolitical world situation, the business climate index, record levels of illness, and many other issues are challenging us. But precisely now, the RWTÜV Group can look towards the upcoming challenges with confidence and a positive outlook.
As employers, we have a responsibility to foster a motivating, forward-thinking mindset. With our corporate culture, which we will specifically strengthen further in all subsidiaries by 2025, we are solidifying the foundation for sustainable employee satisfaction, promoting a spirit of innovation, and productivity. Employees with a positive, optimistic outlook are more resistant to stress and feel comfortable.
Our optimistic outlook is based on the awareness that we have carefully set all the course for the coming months and years, both economic and general: The successive integration of AI into our internal and external processes is bearing fruit. It helps us to analyze and use data in a differentiated way, strengthen our competencies, and keep a firm hand on the reins while keeping long-term decision cycles in view. We are globally positioned, with a values-based culture that combines diverse aspects such as openness to lifelong learning, effective implementation of ESG principles, or the responsible pursuit of security in technology and communication.
Work will be on hiatus in Kronprinzenstraße, home of the RWTÜV Group headquarters, during the „time between the years.“ However, we will be back for you starting the first week of January. With new ideas, renewed motivation, and lots of dynamism – we can promise you that much already. We wish you all relaxing holidays surrounded by family or friends, where you can find peace, or time for things that often get neglected in your packed daily lives. Thank you very much for the good, constructive, and successful collaboration. We are looking forward to the coming year and are heading into the holidays with good spirits; we wish the same for you.
Christmas greetings and all the best for the New Year.,
Thomas Biedermann and Dr. Fabian Fechner
Award-winning
The winners have been decided! As part of the internal 2024 Innovation Competition, the jury, consisting of the Group's managing directors, chose three ideas and awarded them first place.
Martin Kirchner from cetecom advanced convinced the panel with a proposal for AI-powered measurement data analysis. Second place went to an idea for the digital transformation of technical building equipment (TGA) planning using Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Augmented Reality technologies, submitted by Jannik Hausfeld, an employee of RWTÜV subsidiary Ingenieurbüro Nordhorn. Third place was awarded to Frauke Schell from energy solutions provider Enoplan. After winning the community vote among all employees of the group with her idea for internal efficiency improvement, the jury also awarded another of her proposals for AI-powered process and sales optimization.
A total of 30 creative minds submitted 44 suggestions to the RWTÜV competition platform. Campus submitted. The task requested the design of AI-supported processes, products, or services with which employees of the RWTÜV Group companies can provide new services for customers, or work more efficiently or better in their daily lives.
On December 4th, RWTÜV Managing Directors Thomas Biedermann and Dr. Fabian Fechner announced the three winners in an online event: „Heartfelt congratulations to the winners for their convincing ideas! This is the innovative RWTÜV spirit that we need for our future, and that we also see as a top employee motivator. We are now very much looking forward to the implementation.“
Prepared
In the inspiring atmosphere of The Qvest Hotel in Cologne, another RWTÜV leadership training took place at the end of November. In attendance were: 17 participants from the subsidiaries, Managing Director and trainer Wibke Schindler from Klar & Quirlig with her team, as well as Thomas Biedermann, Dr. Fabian Fechner, and Natascha Winter from RWTÜV GmbH.
Part 1 focused on topics such as appreciative communication in employee reviews, role clarification between HR and managers, and diversity and intergenerational work. Key aspects such as recruiting, onboarding, and feedback and evaluation were conveyed in a practical manner.
Part 2 focused on proactive workforce planning, talent management, benefits, and retention. Participants developed team matrices, discussed the advantages and structure of high-performing teams, and explored conflict resolution. This laid the groundwork for sustainable HR strategies.
A cathedral tour and a visit to a brewery rounded off the program on the first day; a visit to the Olympic Museum on the second day provided another framework for relaxed exchange between colleagues. „We use every opportunity not only to continuously develop the group's management personnel but also to further strengthen cohesion between the subsidiaries. This training was again perfectly suited for that,“ assessed Natascha Winter, Business Partner HR at RWTÜV Holding.
Premiere
Dorena D‘Alba and Arina Bolgar are the first two apprentices at Van Ameyde Deutschland. Since starting in September 2023, they have been shaping the premiere of Van Ameyde Deutschland as a training company with full enthusiasm and great commitment. Arina Bolgar, 20, left school after starting upper secondary school to begin her career at the global provider of professional insurance services. Dorena D’Alba, a year older, first completed her Abitur (university entrance qualification) and then started her apprenticeship. Both are enthusiastic about their experiences so far: „The tasks are new and challenging for us, we make phone calls with customers, and we already handle international contacts. We are allowed to work very independently and feel that we are being intensively supported. That's incredibly motivating; we're really growing beyond ourselves!“ says D’Alba. Bolgar adds: ‘In the beginning, we didn't know what claims adjustment or insurance services meant, and by working through these topics, we are discovering completely new sides and interests within ourselves. We are currently in accounting – and even that is fun because you suddenly understand the processes and recognize larger contexts!„,
Wherever practicable, D’Alba and Bolgar are placed in departments together so they can exchange ideas and support each other. In Van Ameyde's teams, which are composed to be as diverse as possible, they benefit from an international and mixed group of colleagues with different horizons of experience; at the same time, Van Ameyde encourages the contribution of one's own ideas and promotes independence, not least through flexible working hours and working from home.
Bianca Goebel, Head of Human Resources at Van Ameyde, is full of praise: „We are thrilled with this first attempt with apprentices: we can rely on both of them one hundred percent, they do full-fledged work, take responsibility, and are even willing to step in at six in the morning. Simply great!”
Doctoral candidate
RWTÜV Managing Director Fabian Fechner also treated himself to a successful completion in a very personal sense. At the end of the year, he completed his doctorate at the University of Gloucestershire with the title: „Money makes the world go round, or does it? An exploration of the decisions of first-generation owner-managers of German Mittelstand firms to seek a business sale and select a buyer for their business.” He had already demonstrated excellent expertise in acquisitions and mergers for the RWTÜV Group multiple times before earning his doctorate, and now he has proof in black and white. Congratulations, Dr. Fabian Fechner!